ill-informed bull
There's so much rubbish in this article I don't know where to start. Here's a couple of things -
>>I am also including the jointly owned BBC and Virgin Media channels, UKTV History and Bright Ideas in the PSB source.<<
Why? joint ownership by BBC Worldwide (that's the self-funded commercial arm) of commercially funded channels (ever spotted the ad breaks? there's enough of em...) does not equal PSB. Channel 4 gets public money. UKTV does not.
>>Basically, refarming of any spectrum is difficult - even playing with power levels and mast position will not give the same coverage as before<<
Under what basis do you make this claim? Remember, this is switch OVER, not switch OFF. The current infrastructure will be renewed and upgraded to provide a digital signal. There is no reason why anyone who could get a 90% perfect analogue picture will not be able to get 90% digital signal - with the added bonus that a 90% digital signal gives them 100% quality. Folks already watching fuzzy analogue signals may be in trouble, agreed, but channel 5 aside, how much of the population is that?
>>TopUpTV requires a different kind of set top box which is not compatible with the main Free To Air boxes<<
Well duh, if you're going to charge for a service you can't really do it with FTA boxes can you! What about SKY and their ridiculous plan to introduce yet another type of set top box incompatible with the main TUTV boxes? Now that's the kind of strategy that's 'fatally flawed'. Unless of course, you're trying to spread FUD to get people to sign up for your own hideously overpriced platform...
Ultimately you appear to be a religious free market ideologist who can't stand the reality - that the BBC and Channel 4 can produce much better TV than the true commercial sector has ever been able to, despite the millions of pounds the moguls throw at it. Of course the Murdochs of this world would like nothing more than to see the end of PSB - then the public would have no choice but to watch their tacky dross and cheap foreign imports - and their ad revenue will multiply.
In your eyes the BBC (and Channel 4) are 'unfair' competition because they produce a far superior product for the consumer!